When I was going over some old Washington Posts at a garage sale, I came across an interesting item from April 6th, 1945, 50 years and a month ago, only a few short months after President Franklin Delano Roosevelt had won his reelection bid for the White House by defeating New York Governor Thomas Dewey by approximately three million votes–an amount some considered narrow. But enough background–here’s the article text I found:
In the course of a discussion on filibusters and Senate rules, Washington’s top Republican gave the 60 juniors a lesson in partisan politics, particularly about the commander in chief. “The man’s cousin was a wonderful human being,” Senate Minority Leader Wallace H. White said in response to a question about President Roosevelt’s policies. “I think this guy is a loser.
“I think President Roosevelt is doing a bad job,” he added to a handful of chuckles.
“He’s driving this country into bankruptcy,” Reid said, referring to the president’s “New Deal” programs. “He’s got us in this intractable war in Europe and Japan where we now have about 405,000 American soldiers dead and another 600,000 injured.”
Don’t remember that one?
Neither do I–other than a change of parties and presidential names, it’s actually from today’s Las Vegas Review-Journal, and the Senate minority leader in question isn’t Republican Wallace H. White, but Democrat Harry Reid.
At least Reid had enough sense afterwards to call Karl Rove (President Bush was in transit to Europe), and “apologized for what I said.”
Update: Ed Morrissey also has some thoughts on Reid, and as Ed puts it, Reid’s bad case of projection, and also his prospects of leading a continued filibuster in the Senate.
Another Update: Some most definitely related thoughts from Victor Davis Hanson.
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